this post was submitted on 08 May 2024
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[–] [email protected] 9 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

Raising fines doesn't doesn't deter criminals from doing crime. They don't have the money to pay the fines, it's not like rich people are going out and stealing cars - people stealing things are typically destitute.

When they generate income from fines what happens is that the police becomes a business instead of a public service. The reality of funding through fines is simply that police begin to find more pointless and small reasons to harass and ticket people, in order to boost their revenue. It becomes a game of maintaining the bottom line, and it's not about doing the right thing or enforcing the rules. Instead of enforcing the rules they will throw the book at you just to generate a buck, and pull you over four blocks down from where you supposedly did a rolling stop.

You can't give public services financial motives. They should always be permitted to operate at a loss because dollar value is not the same as social and societal value. When you create financial motives for a public service it ceases to provide public value at all costs (which is the literal point of social services) and becomes another business cutting corners to make line go up.